The EPA hired industry-friendly scientists as regulators |...

The EPA hired industry-friendly scientists as regulators

Posted 2023-05-08 11:00:56

The EPA has a long history of hiring scientists and senior officials from the companies they're supposed to regulate, letting industry influence the agency's science from within.

In 2010, for example, the agency worked with a team of scientists to assess the risks of hexavalent chromium, a chemical in the movie "Erin Brockovich." But the Center for Public Integrity found that several scientists on the panel defended PG&E, which poisoned a community with the substance. Some of the scientists disagreed with the characterization, with one saying he had passed the EPA's conflict-of-interest review. In 2017, the EPA hired a new senior official in its chemical division who had been an executive at ACC for five years. The New York Times found that she helped guide much of the Trump administration's decision to deregulate chemical.

And Todd Stedeford. Stedeford is a lawyer and toxicologist who has been hired three times by the EPA. During his two most recent jobs at the agency, from 2011 to 2017 and 2019 to 2021, he was employed by corporate employers who used or manufactured chemical regulated by the EPA.

Until 2011, Stedeford worked for Albemarle, one of the world's largest manufacturers of flame retardants. The chemical, which are added to furniture, electronics, and other products to help prevent fires, have been linked to nerve damage, hormone disruption, and cancer. A 2012 Chicago Tribune investigation revealed that Albemarle and two other large manufacturers formed, funded, and controlled a front group that deceived the public about the safety and effectiveness of flame retardants used in furniture.

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